Hutchinson Center to host fourth Suzanne W. Cole Reading Recovery and Early Literacy Institute

More than 140 educators from Maine will gather at the Hutchinson Center in Belfast on May 23 for the annual Suzanne W. Cole Reading Recovery and Early Literacy Institute.

The University of Maine Training Center for Reading Recovery and Comprehensive Literacy has hosted the conference every year since 2015, bringing together teachers throughout the state who specialize in Reading Recovery.

The program provides 12 to 20 weeks of individualized instruction to students in first grade who struggle with reading and writing. The UMaine center provides professional development to teacher leaders, who in turn train Reading Recovery teachers in nearly 60 school districts statewide.

For over 20 years, the program has served more 100,000 Maine children, helping them improve their literacy skills.

This year’s conference, which runs 8 a.m.–2:30 p.m., will feature a talk by Old Town High School senior Emma Hargreaves, who participated in Reading Recovery as a first-grade student and was recently honored as a U.S. Presidential Scholar. The keynote speaker will be Mary K. Lose, professor of reading and language arts and director of the Reading Recovery Center of Michigan at Oakland University.

In addition, members of the Cole family, who for more than 20 years have provided financial support to school districts in Maine that offer Reading Recovery, will be in attendance. Suzanne Cole, for whom the conference is named, passed away in 2017. The annual conference is held in recognition of her extraordinary contribution to teacher education and the literacy success of young children in Maine.